Babble

What is your take on discipline? Are parents today too easy on their children or too hard?

I think parents today are too hard on other parents. It's a tricky thing, learning what discipline works best for a particular child, and there's nothing worse than having another parent go judgmental on you when your child misbehaves. Just like all kids develop at different paces, so do parents need time to adjust and develop and their own effective parenting styles.

Very right! The looks of other parents on the playground, when your 2 year old gets 'boneless' (Mo Willems) can destroy one's self esteem. The discipline question is probably comparable with the sleeping problem: all methods are fine as long as you 'stay the course' - to use a very unpopular saying - and you are comfortable with it. See yesterday's NYTs piece about sleeping: http://www.nytimes.com/2006/12/12/health/12sleep.html?em&ex=1166158800&en=eecddff395a6eb2f&ei=5087%0A And then, sometimes nothing works, and you feel as helpless as your child: you both have to sit it out or wait for a better day.

Yes the Sancti-Mommies kill me. I remember the shocked looks I got in the park when I pulled out a juice box for my then 10-month-old. He had just gotten over a bout of stomach flu and the doctor recommended lots of fluids, especially juice.

Discipline is a difficult thing to navigate as a parent. You want your child to behave but kids are kids and they have bad days just like we do.

I think every generation sort of struggles with this. You can go back hundreds of years and hear writers complaining that young people aren't being disciplined like they should be any more. I think there's a broad range of discipline styles that might work in any given situation and it's up to the parent to decide what is best for them and their child. Other parents are the harshest critics, and honestly, who cares whether our kid gets timeouts rather than toys taken away, as long as the message about the behaviour gets through? Barring serious behaviour problems in kids or, obviously, abuse by the parents, people should let families works this stuff out, unless they ask for help.

My dear mother used to tell me "let your yes's be yes and your no's be no. But save no for the important stuff!"   In other words if you make a decision stick to it, and use your veto power for things that really truley matter.   She didn't tell me how hard it would be to stick to that sometimes.  My 2 children learned very quickly that if I said "I'll think about it, or Perhaps, they had a pretty good chance. She would also say "children are the most forgiving people on the planet,  what you do out of love, or fear for their life,  they will forgive you for.  What you do out of anger will stick with them"  So my best advice is to take a moment and don't react out of anger, whatever your gut tells you, is probably the right thing to do... listen to that, and not the other mother sitting next to you on the park bench unless of course that other woman is your mother.  If the other woman is your mother then I guess you have to decide if  you turned out pretty good or not. I think my mom was very wise.  And I see a whole lot of very good mothers out there today.

I gave up on discipline, and opted to instead teach all the Park Kids how to be bad.  That way, my Lads look good by comparison.

I have a 20 year old son, and a 15 year old daughter and I've seen a lot.  What have I learned?  Controlling parents have out-of-control kids.  Parents who don't trust their kids have kids who lie to their parents.  Parents who drink bring up kids who drink. Etc. 

Simply put and rightfully so.  One must treat their children with respect and dignity, if the parent expects respect and dignity in return. 

My take on discipline is that it is hard to decide what is right and not right. My husband came from a family that had no discipline and were allowed to drink and get high with his parents. I on the other hand was not allowed to do anything. So what do we do about our children? We take it by ear. I think that it is important to teach kids right and wrong no matter what you do. I just think that some people take it to far and some don't take it far enough. I just don't think you can reason with a three year old.